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By R M. Krek

The haulage system used to convey ore from an underground mine to a surface stockpile at the mine process plant is a vital component of the mine’s overall infrastructure and economic viability. The system selected has a significant impact on the set-up of the mine and the access to the underground mine. In turn, the set-up of the mine and the access to the underground mine have a significant impact on the system.A number of haulage technologies are available to transfer the ore from the underground workings to the surface stockpile, including hoists, conveyors, rail and trucks.This paper focuses on the shaft hoisting and inclined conveyor haulage technologies. These technologies have been used consistently to deliver ore from at depth and/or at high tonnage. Previous reviews of the appropriate vertical haulage systems have nominally been restricted to the respective systems only, with no consideration for any other scope or issues that may affect the selection. The selection of the appropriate vertical haulage system, whether shaft hoisting or inclined conveying, needs to consider numerous key factors.CITATION:Krek, R M and Northcote, A E A, 2014. A holistic viewpoint for selecting the vertical haulage system – shafts and conveyors, in Proceedings 12th AusIMM Underground Operators’ Conference 2014 , pp 289–296 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).

Mar 24, 2014

By A B. Christie

The Institute of Geological and Nuclear Sciences' Mineral Resources Programme is currently carrying out research under two major projects:   HAREM (Hauraki Andesite Rhyolite Epithennal Mineralisation) The Hauraki Goldfield lies within a belt of andesite-dacite-rhyolite volcanics of Miocene Pliocene age which is underlain by a basement of Mesozoic greywacke. It contains some 50 separate epithermal gold deposits and is a world-class gold and silver producer. The HAREM project is aimed at improving models of the epithermal gold mineralisation, and to better understand the processes and controls of origin, transport and deposition of the gold.   MARGO - (Marlborough Gold) The MARGO project is aimed at determining the geological factors that controlled the formation of the Mesozoic mesothermal gold-antimony-tungsten deposits in the Marlborough Schist belt. Following reconnaissance work on 12 deposits, our current work is concentrated on deposits in the Wakamarina valley.

Jan 1, 1994

æSustainabilityÆ is one of those words that has gained more usage in popular discourse than in the dictionary. In fact it is not in many dictionaries at all. Typically, given this, it also seems to mean different things depending on whose lips it emerges from. It is now like a code word in that if people say it, you donÆt have to think about its meaning; it is just æthereÆ and is taken for granted. This is a problem for the mining industry as we are now using the term too and to be effective in what we do, we need to have a reality check and see how those outside who have views on us (æstakeholdersÆ maybe) use it. The core issue seems to be æsustainability of whatÆ: the industry?, a company?, the global environment?, particular ecosystems?, the community? At these levels, the term seems almost meaningless. If we do not even agree on what it is, at least broadly, our communication and possible partnerships for going forward will be difficult to say the least. One reference to æsustainÆ in my thesaurus is: æTo keep from failing during stress or difficultyÆ. This may be a clue to something approaching a common notion. I suggest that to use æsustainabilityÆ we make the following assumptions:that we are talking about human activity aimed at making a living that has an impact on the natural and social environment; that humans must make a living (though what this needs to include is problematic); that the impact of particular activities has been problematic to date and needs to be monitored, altered, stopped, etc; that there is stress on both social and natural environments; and that change can be effected in order that particular activities such as mining minimise their negative effects and maximise their positive. This is why we are taking part in sessions such as this one today. Two more initial observations: First, it strikes me that even with the above assumptions laid out, æsustainabilityÆ and æsustainable developmentÆ are too abstract and general as concepts. We have to break these high and mighty ideals down into workable, bite-size chunks, into practical ways of dealing with the world outside our sites and companies. Second, sustainability, on both sides of the fence, too often focuses on nature and environment as though they are independent of people and community. I would argue, perhaps provocatively, that sustainability is primarily a people issue and has to be tackled as such. I want to look at the overall climate for business today and how it has responded before I return to what we can and need to do as the mining industry to make æsustainabilityÆwork.

Jan 1, 2002

By J C. Carlile

Many low sulphidation epizonal gold and zinc-lead vein deposits within magmatic arcs are situated on basement highs, and post-date both the main volcanic episode and porphyry copper (gold) mineralisation. These features are best explained by emplacement of a flat batholith a few kilometres beneath each mineral district, as recently demonstrated by geophysical data in the Baia Mare district of Romania. The batholith provides heat for the hydrothermal system, and results in extensional faulting both through up-doming of the overlying rocks, and in some arcs through incipient collapse of the thermally weakened crust under regional extensional stress. More water-rich magmas emplaced at greater depths could explain some deep epizonal and mesothermal gold deposits situated outside magmatic arcs.

Jan 1, 1995

A New Online Detection Method for Arsenic Minerals in Process Streams

Sep 13, 2010

The New Zealand Minerals Industry is small but growing. Over the next 10 years it will be facing stiff international competition for skills to support this growth, particularly from Australia who are forecasting that a further 70 000 people will be employed by 2015.   The value of commodities mined and quarried in NZ continues to increase; and the value of coal, metals and industrial minerals production reached $1.505 billion in 2006, an increase of 15 per cent on 2005. Production increases will continue à. Latest Crown Minerals statistics show that national prospecting and exploration expenditure rose to $29.9 million in the year ended March 31 2006 û an increase of 46 per cent from the $20.4 million spent in the March 2005 year. The equivalent 2001 year expenditure was only $2.48 million.   The industry already experiences difficulty in recruiting the people it needs with ongoing demand for skilled underground miners, trades people, and mining professionals. This discussion paper will outline the national context with regard to labour, skills and training. It will suggest options and provide an opportunity for conference participants to discuss the way forward.

Jan 1, 2007

By M D. Griffith

Oct 12, 2022

By C J. Moran

Given that the mining industry is committed to sustainable development principles and that Australia is experiencing changes to the regulatory environment that aim to modernise the water sector and encourage adoption of consistent approaches, there is a well defined need for the Australian minerals industry to develop a water accounting framework. This requires: key terms and definitions for water metrics for use in the Australian minerals industry that is consistent with the wider water sector, a suite of metrics representing key components of an operationÆs water balance, a calculation method for some of the metrics, and a reporting protocol. This paper presents the methodology that was used to derive these four components. Existing accounting frameworks were reviewed and key terms and definitions that were consistent with current requirements were proposed. A calculation methodology was developed to obtain some of the key indicators and variables that cannot be easily measured directly (water loss through evaporation is an example). The adopted terms and definitions dictated model development, with the conclusion that a systems approach was the most effective calculation process. To test the proposed definitions and calculation methodology, values for water metrics were derived for eight sites. The proposed framework and definitions could deal with the specific situations selected as case studies. The associated calculation methodology produced complete accounts at various levels. Some elements of the accounts could be directly checked against available data and simulations. The framework captured well variations in the reuse efficiencies; reuse efficiency could even vary for similar processes. It is concluded that this preliminary accounting framework provides a consistent language and metrics for quantifying and communicating water management, both at the intersection of the site with the surrounding landscape (through detailed reporting of site inputs and outputs) and within operational activities. Using this consistent framework for quantifying and documenting water use within an operation will provide a platform for compiling and comparing minerals industry water use with other sectors. This may support benchmarking activities within regions or companies and help demonstrate leadership amongst water users in water resource stewardship. The approach presented here is applicable to a wide variety of mining and processing activities, and biophysical environments, and can be adopted as the first step towards developing national water accounts for the Australian Minerals Industry.

Jan 1, 2009

By G Harbort, D Zoetbrood

"The Phu Kham copper-gold operation in the Laos People’s Democratic Republic (PDR) is owned and operated by Phu Bia Mining Limited. PanAust Limited holds a 90 per cent interest in Phu Bia Mining Limited, with the remaining ten per cent held by the Laos PDR Government.The original 12 Mt/a copper-gold concentrator at Phu Kham commenced production in April 2008. An incremental improvement program resulted in a number of circuit changes being incorporated by 2011, including conversion of conditioning tanks to flotation cells and the installation of a Jameson Cell cleaner scalper. In 2012 the Phu Kham Upgrade Project was commissioned to increase throughput to 18 Mt/a. In April, 2013 the Phu Kham Increased Recovery Project was commissioned to maximise performance by debottlenecking the plant IsaMill™ regrind and cleaning capacity.With the variable mineralogy of Phu Kham ore, control of the c concentrate regrind circuit is essential in terms of achieving effective liberation to maintain concentrator performance. On a routine basis laboratory regrind signature plot data is compared with daily surveys of the operational IsaMills™. More extensive surveys are also conducted to determine size distribution on a mineralogical basis and the effect of fine regrinding on pulp electrochemistry and flotation performance. This paper provides a review of the operating performance of the Phu Kham IsaMills™ with regard to power draw, feed and product size distribution, feed per cent solids, mineralogy and pulp electrochemistry. Operating performance is compared with the IsaMill™ signature plot test for predicting performance.Citation:Harbort, G, Zoetbrood, D and McNab, B, 2016. Operating Performance of the Phu Kham IsaMill™, in Proceedings 13th AusIMM Mill Operators’ Conference 2016, pp 39–50 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne)."

Oct 10, 2016

Conditional simulation can be used to determine the probabilities of block iron-grades being above selected cut-offs. However, there are much faster alternatives that can produce acceptable results. In this paper blasthole data from a selected area of Joffre Member hosted ore of the Brockman Iron Formation at the Mt Whaleback orebody is used as the basis of a case study to assess alternatives to simulation. Iron grade, in per cent, is interpolated from a blasthole dataset into a block model using ordinary kriging. Samples are then removed from this blasthole dataset to produce data subsets. A complete distribution of iron grades for points or blocks is obtained utilising the data subsets and the following techniques: conditional simulation, median indicator kriging, the probability from conditional expectation and confidence intervals attached to the estimation of blocks in the framework of the discrete Gaussian model. The complete blasthole dataset is considered to represent the true iron grades at sample point support while the ordinary kriging estimate derived from these samples is considered to represent the true block grades. The distributions obtained from point estimates, block estimates and simulations are compared to each other and to the true estimates of iron grades using graphs and statistics. The conditional expectation technique reproduced the results obtained from conditional simulation extremely well and it is a viable alternative to simulation at point support. At block support the confidence intervals technique reproduced the results of the conditional simulation more closely than the median indicator kriging and in the data subsets tested the confidence intervals technique actually reproduced the true grade distribution more closely than the conditional simulation.

Jan 1, 2005

By A B. Christie, R L. Brathwaite

Since the first occupation of New Zealand in 800 - 900 AD, various useful minerals, rocks, and energy resources have been identified and extracted. The Maori prized greenstone for ornaments, tools, and weapons, used argillite and obsidian for tools, and decorated their carvings and bodies with colours made from clays, limonite, and vivianite. They were aware of coal (waro), but are not known to have used it for fuel. Before 1840, visiting whalers used coal from Shag Point to heat their trypots. Mining activities got underway in the 1840s, with the finding of manganese oxide deposits in the Bay of Islands, Kawau Island, Waiheke+ Island, and Taieri Mouth. Secondary copper ore was mined on Kawau Island (1846 - 1869), and native sulphur was exported from White Island to Europe. The discovery of gold at Coromandel in 1852 and a few years later in Northwest Nelson and Otago opened the way to gold rushes in these areas and subsequently in Marlborough and Westland. Mining of alluvial gold evolved through sluicing to the invention of gold dredges; first (1863) was the simple spoon design, but later (1881) large steam-powered bucket-ladder machines weighing around 3800 tonnes were built. Most of the gold dredges had gone by the early 1960s, following a revival in the 1930s, but one large dredge operates today on the Grey River. Other mining events included: underground mining of coal from 1849 and underground mining of lode gold from 1863 in the Coromandel, Reefton, and Otago fields. Most outcropping coal deposits had been discovered by 1870. Building stones were used by the early settlers for construction of houses, churches, banks, public buildings, and some universities from 1836. Aggregate for roads, railway ballast, and concrete, and limestone for cement and fertiliser, and clays for bricks and china have been quarried for many years.

Jan 1, 1993

Recovery of Vanadium from Stone Coal Through an Environmentally Friendly Acid Leaching Technology

Sep 13, 2010

Correlation of Air Recovery with Thin Film and Froth Stability in Flotation

Sep 13, 2010

Natural Gas has been available in New Zealand for twenty years. During that time the gas share of the energy market has grown and now natural gas forms a significant part of New Zealand's energy scene, helping consumers to achieve a higher standard of living, and reducing dependence upon imported oil. Natural gas is now used for petrochemical manufacture and power generation in addition to direct supply to consumers. As concern for the environment continues to build, natural gas will have an increasingly important role to fill in these markets. This paper sets out the background to the development of natural gas in New Zealand and identifies the current markets. It then looks at those matters which are likely to influence the role of natural gas in the 1990s.

Jan 1, 1990

By M Dietrich

The paper describes an efficient method for analysing the different attachment kinematics of excavators and other linkages by taking into account digging forces, the workspace and the stability of the machines. The different attachment kinematic systems of hydraulic excavators and a æclassical analysing methodÆ will be presented. The method was integrated as a plug-in for the multibody simulation (MBS) software MSC.ADAMS to create an easy to use solution for design engineers. A comparison of the new MBS-solution with the classical static analysis is a part of this paper and shows the advantages of the new method. This takes into account the manifold and new dynamic analysing opportunities, as well as more detailed models leading to more accurate results.

Sep 26, 2011

Contact Angle Measurements on Lignite Surface

Sep 13, 2010

By D Craw, J Pope, B Peake

Southland contains over 70 per cent of New ZealandÆs recoverable coal resources, and an investigation into the potential effects of coal mining on SouthlandÆs water resources is therefore of interest. This paper investigates pit-lake water quality in relation to current mining activities within the sub-bituminous coal and lignite deposits of Southland.   Water quality data was collected from pit-lakes in sub-bituminous and lignite deposits from October 2005 to March 2006. After periods of settled weather, turbidity increased with depth at the sub-bituminous pit-lake (10 - 21 NTUs from 5 - 30 m). In the stratified sub-bituminous pit-lake in March 2006, heavy rainfall caused higher turbidity in the epilimnion than the top of the hypolimnion (20 NTU vs 13 NTU) reflecting surface water runoff (up to 1993 NTUs) and epilimnion mixing. In contrast, turbidity at the lignite sites was variable due to the shallowness of the lakes, but noticeable increases following disturbance and adverse weather were recorded. High turbidity at the sub-bituminous deposits was attributed to the presence of clay minerals such as kaolinite whereas turbidity at the lignite sites was more likely short term and a result of heavier minerals such as quartz.   Trace element concentrations at both sites were low when compared to mine waters in other coal areas in New Zealand and no samples exceeded ANZECC water quality trigger values for 80 per cent species protection. Pit-lake water pH levels were lower and more variable in the lignite deposit (4.18 - 7.30 vs 7.24 - 8.98 in the sub-bituminous deposits). In the lignite pit-lakes, higher concentrations of trace elements (eg Dissolved As - 0.034 ppm and Dissolved Mn - 1.09 ppm) and lower pH (ÿ4) were observed at the bottom of active pits compared to inactive pits. It is possible that quartz pebble conglomerates containing sulphide minerals within the lignite seams are responsible for this.   Further investigation into the mine waters, waste rock and lake sediments will help get a better understanding of the results observed and long term processes that occur.

Jan 1, 2006

By Y M. Wang, W Z. Liu, L F. Li, X L. Zhang

Based on the blasting crater theory, the equation between k under typical cases and burden line, charge height was obtained by open pit bench blasting analysis model. The model was calculated with mine production blasting. The blastability coefficient k and the best range of blasting burden line were specially emphasised on determination of lateral crater tests.CITATION:Wang, Y M, Liu, W Z, Zhang, X L and Li, L F, 2015. Application of lateral crater test in open pit blasting parameters optimisation, in Proceedings 11th International Symposium on Rock Fragmentation by Blasting, pp 463–468 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).

Aug 24, 2015

Open pit mining at Bingham Canyon commenced in 1904 and about two billion tonnes of ore have been extracted since then. There remain just under one billion tonnes of ore in the pit and this will be mined by 2015. Because the porphyry system extends below the ultimate pit limits, Kennecott Utah Copper Corporation initiated a study in 1997 to determine the viability of underground mining. The study was initiated at that time because the results were to be used to compare the economics of a further pit expansion to that of an underground mine. If a pit expansion was viable then overburden removal would have to start in the near future. This paper is a summary of the work that was carried out for the underground study. Block cave mining was determined to be the most appropriate method to mine the deposit. Two block cave areas have been planned with a total production rate of 72 500 tpd. Additional sources of ore will come from skarn orebodies that are associated with the porphyry deposit. The geology of the deposits is described together with the geotechnical techniques that were used to characterise the rock in the absence of more detailed data that are normally available. A general description of the mine plan is given along with the reasons for selecting the particular methodology used. The study was completed at the end of 1998 and demonstrated the viability of underground mining at Bingham Canyon. Funds have been approved for further drilling and technical studies, which will lead up to a feasibility study in 2004/5.

Jan 1, 2000

By N Clarke, R Dineen, W Jones

The Mt Lyell copper mine in western Tasmania has discharged acid drainage (AD) into the Queen and King Rivers and Macquarie Harbour for over a century. Presently, dissolved copper loads of about 1000 tonnes per annum and dissolved aluminium loads of >2000 tonnes per annum are contained in the AD, which is derived from underground workings (~60 per cent) and historic waste rock dumps (~40 per cent). Flows vary from about 100 L/s during dry periods, to >400 L/s during the wet winter. The site is presently operated by Copper Mines of Tasmania (CMT) who are not responsible for the acid drainage generated from the mine site. Although western Tasmania is famous for its mining history, tourism and aquaculture have emerged as the new industries on the West Coast, with a major tourism railway (the Abt) recently opened along the banks of the Queen and King Rivers. The emergence of these industries in a æclean greenÆ Tasmania has resulted in a strong community and government push to remediate the acid drainage. Remediation investigations and efforts at Mt Lyell were initiated by the Department of Primary Industries, Water and Environment (DPIWE), previously known as DELM, in 1995, and have included the quantification of environmental impacts arising from the AD, and the investigation and costing of potential remediation options. A primary focus of the work has been to identify cost-neutral options which recover metals from the AD in a saleable form to help defray on going treatment costs. This paper summarises these activities in generally a chronological order, highlighting findings of the program that are potentially applicable to other acid drainage sites.

Jan 1, 2003